The role of plasma

Blood is an essential component for maintaining our body's multiple functions, including oxygen transport, nutrient transport, body defense and resistance to foreign pathogenic microorganisms, and waste excretion. Our blood is composed of a variety of substances, including tangible and intangible components. The tangible components refer to red blood cells, white blood cells, etc., and the intangible components mainly refer to plasma. Plasma makes up a large part of the blood.

What is plasma? Many people cannot tell the difference between plasma and serum. Simply put, serum plus coagulation substances is plasma. It can also be said that plasma minus coagulation substances is serum. Next, let’s take a general look at the role of plasma.

The main function of plasma is to carry blood cells, transport substances needed to maintain human life activities and waste produced in the body, etc. Plasma is equivalent to the intercellular matrix of connective tissue. Plasma is an important component of blood and is a pale yellow liquid. Among the chemical components of plasma, water accounts for 90~92%, and the other 10% is mainly solute plasma protein, and contains electrolytes, nutrients, enzymes, hormones, cholesterol and other important components. Plasma protein is a general term for a variety of proteins, which can be divided into three categories: albumin, globulin and fibrinogen by the salting-out method.

To sum up, we have a general understanding of the role of plasma. Although plasma is an invisible component of our blood, the ingredients it contains are indeed indispensable to us. In daily life, if certain diseases occur in our bodies, it will also cause changes in plasma components, so we can use changes in plasma components to assist in the diagnosis of diseases.